Weekly Character Discussion: Samus

[Overswarm]

It's been late every week.... so I'm doing this again, as promised to the WCD thread.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dw_2ghHRTNA

There aren't many "advanced techniques" with Samus that have surfaced, but due to her unique physics I'd imagine there are a few undiscovered things about her yet.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-U6iFKZnrTI&feature=related

You can see a few things this Samus player does that are interesting. The G&W isn't that great, but it still works. There aren't many good Samus players out there, and most of those that have Samus as a character don't really main her.

I originally completely discounted Samus in Brawl as being worthless... but she's incredibly heavy and has several approach options as well as a lagless zair that can halt a short hopping opponent in their tracks.

 

[AlphaZealot]

Samus is only the second character that I have found an attack which does not suffer from move degeneration/stale moves.

The Z-Air, nonsweetspotted, will always do 4%. The Z-Air, sweetspotted, will always do 7%.

I've also found a combo most people don't know about and I believe is unblockable:
short hop rising uncharged shot, N-Air just before landing, F-Smash, does 22% damage and shouldn't be stopped if the charge shot lands. Which also reminds me, she has two types of short hop double air attacks: short hop uncharged shot > Nair or Uair, or Short hop Bair into >nair or Uair.

Then there is double homing missiles, triple homing missiles, edge jumped missiles/zair, zair > grab/, zair > charge shot, edge jump fair > fsmah/charge shot/etc.

Bomb jumping is nerfed but till doable. Short hop missiling is also nerfed, short hop homing missiles is the new short hopped missiles.

Bad at KOing, good spike though. B-Air/Charge shot seem like best options for KO's. Otherwise, spiking/edge guarding.

I believe all her air attacks autocancel.

 

[LeeHarris]

Samus is by far one of my favorite characters to play. Hopefully I can get some videos up before next week of some of my tricks.

She really doesn't have too much trouble KOing if you mix up her moves well enough. Her up tilt is still a good kill move and it's great for hitting people rolling back onto the stage. Her f smash can kill pretty well as long as you keep it fresh. The zair can even kill fairly well if you hit with the tip.

Some of my favorite combos that are blockable but usually hit anyway are: First hit of jab to dtilt, first hit of jab to utilt, dair to jab, end of nair to zair, zair to running grab, canceled homing missile to dash attack, canceled homing missile to running grab, and there are tons more.

And another amazing Samus combo (which appears to be unblockable) : fast falled uair to up B. It rules.

Also, her nair is awesome at breaking out of combos or preventing follow up attacks.

 

[Hylian]

I invented Samus .


Spot saved for my super long post .

 

[Zankoku]

Samus' nerfed projectiles sadden me.

dair is a lot easier to hit with, it seems. Do ALL of her aerials autocancel?!

 

[Hylian]

Samus' nerfed projectiles sadden me.

dair is a lot easier to hit with, it seems. Do ALL of her aerials autocancel?!

Yes. All of them. Including missiles.

 

[LeeHarris]

I don't think they are nerfed. They are different, but not really nerfed. The homing missiles are far better this time around and allow Samus to set up some awesome combos. The smash missiles aren't as good, but with Brawl having such low hit stun and a strong defense game, could you see the canceled smash missiles of Melee being any good?

Her uncharged shots actually got a boost and are much more useful. Her fully charged shot is a lot weaker, but it comes out a lot quicker and it can be used in many more situations. It also charges quicker.

Her bombs suck balls though

 

[SamuraiPanda]

Samus is one of those characters that I wish I knew how to play, since she is so fun to use, but suck whenever I try.

When the game was first released, I was sure that Samus was the worst in the game. My opinion didn't change much for quite some time, until I saw this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQ5NL8Gr1Ig

That video made me realize that Samus has much more potential than I had given her credit for. Given, the video is rather old, and the Samus loses, but its moreso the strategies I saw that Samus use that impressed me. Then when I saw some videos of Tudor, I knew for sure that I was underestimating her by far. If you can play her right, I bet she can definitely become a force to reckon with in the future.

 

[Emblem Lord]

Well, I'm different from some of you in that I never thought she was the worst, but I never thought she was good either.

She can do some pretty cool stuff and her projectile game is strong. And Zair is nice too and opens up alot of combo possibilities. Unfortunately for her she has been pretty much abandoned by all the skillful players who mained her.

Seems like TGM, Rohins, and Tudor are the only good Samus mains now, and I'm not even sure if the actually MAIN her still or if she is just a secondary of theirs. Although I'm fairly certain that TGM a.k.a Xyro mains her.

Hylain is correct in saying he made Samus...but now he mains G&W. I will take this as an indicator that Samus isn't all that great.

Also I'm not here to pump up anybodies main ok? I call it like I see it. From a competitive point of view a character is a tool to be used to attain victory. So either a character is strong or that character is weak. I'm oversimplifying things, but what I'm saying is the truth more or less.

Samus has some nice things about her like being heavy, good projectile game, ALL her aerials auto-cancel, decent spike, Zair, good comboability, and some other things that I didn't mention.

Good stuff, but she has glaring weaknesses that hold her back.

Her roll is atrocious. Which means if you pressure her that's one less option she can rely on. None of her smashes can be classified as good. And Samus is very bad at KOing. Her best KO option is d-tilt which doesn't seem to be safe on block and only has decent execution time.

Also her projectile game while it's good, dealing with missiles isn't that difficult. They can be shielded, swatted, rolled past, and jumped over. And it seems like the only effective way to play her is like a FPS.

Run away, shoot some projectiles, run away some more rinse repeat. When your opponent makes a mistake you can get a KO provided their percent is high enough. Only problem with this is that it makes Samus one dimensional and thus predictable. Samus doesn't have a great approach game. She lacks the speed for it or the aerials. She is camping based character. But once you get past that she doesn't have the tools to keep you at bay or kill reliably at lower percents.

There are alot of nice advantages she has, but since she is lacking in a few key areas like KO ability she does end up being one of the weaker characters in the game. Bottom tier? No. Not a chance from what I can tell. And certainly not the worst. But low tier seems most likely.

 

[Kyari]

I agree with everything you said except the part about none of her smashes being classifiable as good

 

[Emblem Lord]

Her smashes aren't good or bad. Just average.

 

[Hylian]

Rohins is the only other samus player I have seen that is good aside from myself. I don't main her anymore, but I still use her in tournament a lot vs Marths and Snakes.

If Samus had two kill moves, she would be a high tier character EASILY. But she has 0 kill moves. Her dair is pretty much the only way to kill people.

She can do amazing in certain match-ups, but she has horribile match-ups with wayyy to many characters which is why I don't main her anymore.

I know everything about this character though >_>.

 

[Overswarm]

How 'bout you post it, Hylian?

 

[Dr Drew the Dragon]

My Samus experience involves one match against Hylian's Samus as Snake.

My impression was "wow Samus is annoying, too bad she kinda sucks though".

In the end my ftilt + mortar slide strategy won out (though if I recall we were both at high percents on our last stocks).

She's got some neat/annoying stuff that keeps her from being completely awful, but I'm having a hard time seeing her into the middle of the pack even.

 

[AlphaZealot]

As a note, she has "shield dashing" or what I call dash canceled attacks (dash, then cancel dash with shield, tap the shield button so it drops fast, then just do whatever attack you want, the shield works like pivoting). Its similar to pivoting in Melee but a little slower and replaces her roll for some situations.

For me, killing wise, I rely on the D-Air and Z-Air > charge shot. Secondaries...shrug, depends on percent but U-Tilt, D-Tilt, F-Smash, B-Air, and D-Smash, B-Air probably third most used for me, killing wise.

I don't have a super amount of experience with Samus, maybe 60 matches or so. He was my third character in Melee (shrug, like 500-1000 matches probably) and a lot of stuff transfered over, plus hes the kinda style I like: annoy, war of attrition, patience, hit and run. All things I did in Melee with Peach/Doc/Samus and most of what I do in Brawl with Diddy.

 

[LeeHarris]

Don't get me wrong, Samus is a mid tier character at best. She is one of those characters that you use as a secondary against certain characters. She reminds me a lot of Ganon in that sense. I would never ever ever use Ganon against a MK, but I would against a Snake, DK, etc. I would use Samus against Snake, DK, Marth, sometimes MK, etc. It's usually the fact that I'm good with crap characters no one plays against that gives me the advantage in those matchups.

Also, I owned Hylian's Samus with my noob Dedede with my eyes closed and no hands.

And he owned me in a Samus ditto.

 

[CORY]

He

>: O egads!

 

[AlphaZealot]

<.<

10characctersllslsslslie

 

[LeeHarris]

Samus has a package

 

[g-regulate]

i spam missiles and grab all match, missiles force your opponent to jump over them, because shielding or eating the missle will get caught in grab every time. go for spikes, spam Zair as needed. uairs and fairs combo slightly well, do mediocre damage. i try to kill with dtilt and bair, sometimes utilt and fsmash. has an awesome off-stage game with multiple options to recover, including defending with missiles. shes about mid tier id say, takes a true pro with her to max out her potential.

 

[Overswarm]

Is it possible to fast falled fair to f-smash with Samus without them having time to react?

I've seen a few Samus players to fair to (something) combos by hitting with just one hit from the fair and then hitting them during the stun... if this is the case, Samus has an "insta combo" ala Fox's drillshine from Melee. That would increase her abilities significantly, as Samus' game could then revolve around finding that opening.

 

[LeeHarris]

OS: It appears that way. I do it all the time with uair. I'll try the beginning of the fair and post.

 

[Overswarm]

Okay, Samus is MUCH better than I give her credit for.

Her biggest saving graces, in my opinion, are....

1. Grab release opportunities

Samus has a very fast grab attack. Each hit recharges your moves, and this means all of Samus' moves are going to be fresh 99% of the time. That is HUGE.

Just as important is what you can do AFTER. A common kill combo I have is to simply grab someone, hit a repeatedly, then d-tilt them when they get out. You don't have time to grab them again due to Samus' start up lag for her grab, and often a character can shield the slower attacks such as d-tilt (sadly).

However, this gives Samus a very effective mix-up game. She can grab release to single jab to grab to grab release to charge shot to grab to d-tilt, etc., etc., etc. I wish I recorded all my games with Samus, but I only recorded a few against my little brother; I'll be putting them up shortly. Needless to say, she's got some nifty opportunities here.

The moment your opponent gets in the habit of shielding, you can grab, attack, grab release and grab again. When he isn't shielding and is near 100%-120%, you can d-tilt for the kill. This is extremely important to Samus, as it gives her a mix-up game that can't actually be "countered". Samus has an option for whatever you do, and it turns into rock paper scissors. That makes Samus deadly.

My favorite personally is the grab release to full charge shot ^_^

2. Her dair

Her dair has crazy priority. I down-aired Squirtle and Charizard both out of their up+b with ease. That is crazy. It's incredibly easy to use and Samus can ALWAYS get back.

A lot of characters can't really edgeguard so much as hold the edge then hit their opponent after they use their up+b; it's very hard to edgeguard effectively in Brawl. Samus doesn't have it much easier, but with her down-air, it gives you a low-risk / high-reward scenario every time your opponent is off the edge. If you are able to read your opponent, it costs them a stock. This ties in well with her next saving grace...

3. Her survivability

Samus lives a long time and can always get back unless you do something silly. What's crazier is you can DI straight down and hit Z when you are at ridiculously high % and you'll grab the edge with your tether, stopping your momentum. You can survive for a long time in this manner.

4. Her automatic combos

Samus can, with her u-air, fair, uncharged charge shot, bomb, and grab release set up automatic combos. This means, EVERY time you do X, you can do Y. They're not easy to pull off (if only her fair had a lower hitbox...), but if you do pull it off, it's a free f-smash. The ability to land a decent smash attack whenever you want is a boon not many characters have.

Since Samus' big problem is getting KOs, I imagine that if someone was willing to practice with this character enough and create/find opportunities to use those automatic combos.... she wouldn't have nearly as much trouble. Samus isn't crazy good, but she's definitely not a horrible character. I imagine she will be exactly as she was in Melee; a few players wlil be very talented with her and just completely destroy certain matchups and be a unique and difficult opponent.


Also, I hate to say this, but.... she might be a heavy ROB counter. I originally laughed at this, but Samus' dair and fully charged charge shot are ROB's worst nightmare. Since ROB can't air-dodge out of his up+b, he is completely vulnerable from above by Samus' dair. For the same reason, Samus can jump down and fully charge shot him for a KO. This is all theory, but I'm generally right about things with ROB....

ROB still has the advantage on the stage, but iwth as long as Samus lives and her ability to force anyone to approach by utilizing her zair.... that could be a tough nut to crack.

 

[Tope]

Good post OS

 

[MookieRah]

I basically devoted all of today to playing Samus after watching a few vids, and I think she's pretty nifty myself. It was awkward at first, but oddly enough, she's on par with my secondaries now, if not better O_o. I definitely think she is better than what most people in this thread have said, although she still has some flaws.

Samus has a very fast grab attack. Each hit recharges your moves, and this means all of Samus' moves are going to be fresh 99% of the time. That is HUGE.

Hells yeah, I was doing that **** too. When they are at high percent you can get like 5-6 grab attacks off EASY, and that makes my bairs kill again. It's freaking great.

Also, something OS didn't talk about, but it's fairly common knowledge these days, her tether allows her to gimp the balls of some characters. I was pulling this off on my friends Diddy fairly often. I would assume this would work well for Fox and Falco too. Not to mention that simply running off and doing an uncharged shot parallel to the stage can totally jack their illusion nonsense.

Also, I hate to say this, but.... she might be a heavy ROB counter.

I was wondering this myself actually, as my friend picked ROB and while it is far from his main it's still a solid secondary, and honestly I was trashing him pretty hardcore. The only time I lost was when I was doing dumb stuff like trying to spike him multiple times and stuff, but if I abused zairs, played smart/safe it seemed like the matchup was in favor of Samus IMO.

For the same reason, Samus can jump down and fully charge shot him for a KO.

Yeah, I was doing that as well. It's ******** and much easier/safer than going for a dair spike too. Stage spiking with a charged shot is just silly XD.

 

[LeeHarris]

I dunno about the ROB counter thing. I'm not saying ROB has the advantage, but I don't think Samus has the advantage. ROB has enough up B to completely circumvent any chasing Samus. And ROB can outcamp Samus.

I played with DK against one of the best Samus players in TX (Xyro) in tourney and I couldn't approach for ****. He won that round. I 2 stocked him with ROB after because I'd avoid all the spikes and rack up damage quickly with lasers/gyros.

Next thing you know, OS will be raving about Link

 

[MookieRah]

ROB after because I'd avoid all the spikes and rack up damage quickly with lasers/gyros.

Yeah, I found out pretty fast that if you actually try too hard to spike and crap you will end up taking way too much damage. Getting greedy off the stage is a bad policy when you are playing against a ROB.

ROB has enough up B to completely circumvent any chasing Samus.

Yeah, he could fly above and prevent from getting shot at, but it's definitely an option that comes with a decent amount of risk, especially if Samus bairs him back out cause of being a sitting duck after using his up B. It's not a fun scenario for ROB that Samus has such a nifty little advantage against him.

 

[Overswarm]

Nah, Link sucks. I tried to make him work, he just doesn't. Whenever I play a Link I just go on autopilot and don't snap out of it until the victory screen.

 

[Overswarm]

Summary:


Samus is a unique character with a lot of depth. She is much more difficult to use than the majority of characters in this game, and as such has a much harder time in tournament play. Consistency troubles aside, she is a solid character that is held above water by her natural strengths: a heavy weight, good air mobility, a strong aerial game, a strong combo game, an excellent recovery, and a good projectile game.

While Samus excels in many areas, she lacks in killing power. Many of her kill moves are slow to come out, require charging, or are very easy to see coming; it isn't often that you see a Samus player hop towards you with her back facing you, and when she does you know a bair is coming.

It is likely that Samus' issue of killing power will become less prominent over time; her aerials all auto-cancel, allowing her to short hop an aerial into an opponent, land, and then immediately f-smash or d-tilt to attempt a KO. She also has a great setup from her grab release to do large amounts of damage or potentially get off a KO move.

Samus also has the ability to turn into Zamus mid-game by using the d-pad; while this will more than likely not be a prominent feature to her gameplay, it is possible that Samus could switch into ZSS to use the items as KO capable attacks late in the game.

 

[ll Mafia ll]

Hmm, I have read this thread twice, and I plan to do a lot more of the grab release thing.
Otherwise, got most other things down as well.

Thanks for the analysis!

Now for more testing...

 

[TaurusOxford]

0_0 I didn't know samus' grab attack recharged her KO power. That would help me out tremendously in fights.

BY the way Overswarm, your sig is hilarious. XD

 

[A2ZOMG]

All grab attacks count towards diminishing returns. That makes them very useful in Brawl, especially if they are fast.

And I dunno why, but for some odd reason, Samus seems to be the one character Falcon cannot autocancel D-air to Knee COMBO (this works on all other characters in training mode if I recall, and it is legit). Just something random.

 

[n00b]

Good discussion. I've seen a couple of "new" things to these subforums, but I'm not sure if they're entirely applicable. Short hop charge shot is nice but it wouldn't work on standing characters and is easily punished if whiffed, but the marginal stun of uncharged shot does allow for followup aerials->autocancel->followup ground game.

As for grab release mindgames, I played around with it and noticed that Samus DOES have an insanely fast grab attack if you time your attack inputs right. With the right rhythm they're like the speed of her uair haha.

I would like to hear some setups for getting a grab, in, though. Her dashing grab and pivot grab are the only decent grab approaches, I think, but they're easily punished all the same. I know homing missile/zair pressure to grab sometimes works, but not against opponents who savvy up to. Any suggestions for grab mix-ups?

Keep it going!

EDIT: does anyone know the original hint for Samus? I'd like to know :]

 

[stealthsushi]

Awesome, I guessed this week's character correctly I'm surprised that the Z-Air didn't get mentioned specifically in Samus' summary. I'd vote Samus into mid-tier, and about low-High Tier at best. She's got a lot of variety, and I love characters that utilize a large portion of their moves (Sheik, Peach, Samus :D )

Despite the weaknesses in her game-- same crappy roll, horrendous KO moves, weaker Full Charged Shot, weaker Power Missiles, and not as useful bombs-- her strengths do a good job of being able to mask them. Let me go into detail on a few:

Z-Air
My favorite move in the game (second is Sheik's DACUS, go Sheik!!). This thing has insane priority, massive range, good stun time, auto-cancels, and isn't affected by stale moves. This by itself lets Samus move from defense-to-offense, and offense-to-defense quickly. It makes up for her horrendous roll, as you can short hop backwards or forwards and fire off a Z-Air in the time it takes to roll. Although someone can learn the timing and simply shield it, you've just gotten the upper hand by forcing them to shield. With this kind of control, you can utilize Samus's other strengths.

Homing Missiles / Uncharged Shot
Homing missiles and uncharged shot are underrated and are often labeled as bad once you've seen the limited use of power missiles and the not-as-vicious charged shot. You can shield them, clash with them, or spot-dodge/roll past them, but those put you on the defensive, buying time for Samus to sneak in that Z-Air. She does a great job manipulating the battlefield with these two moves, creating opportunities for you to approach. The Homing Missiles are also very nice for allowing Samus to recover as they linger in the air and can cause enough hitstun for you to safely tether/screw attack back.

Auto-Cancelled Aerials
All of Samus' aerials auto-cancel the instant you touch the floor, which allow for relatively flowing chains of attacks. This also helps out Samus' terrible KO game as you can sneak in those KO moves with these auto-cancel frames. Z-Air to Charge Shot, F-Air's to D-Tilt, D-Air to F-Smash-- the possibilities are numerous.

Great Spacing Tools
Luckily Samus' approach is quite good, she can space well with F-Tilts, D-Tilts (has a slightly larger hitbox than you think), Z-Airs, and that awesome Jab of hers.

Grab + Chozo Chop (Grab Attack)
Samus' training with the Chozo's finally paid off with her crazy fast chop attacks that refresh your stale moves in an instant. Also, her running grab has decent speed and range. All her throws provides Samus with that highly desirable space that allows her to initiate her amazing aerial game.

Samus has many more advantages to her game, but she definitely requires patience to learn and the effort to keep control over the battle. The apparent KO weakness is made up for in small parts by these strengths, but with few go-to moves for KO's, Samus mains (and secondaries) have to work for those KOs. She's flexible and has a very dynamic game. There's definitely potential to move up in the tier-ranks, but the metagame knowledge and mindgames needed to fully utilize her power will keep her from the top.

 

[A2ZOMG]

Bleh, she looks like a low tier R.O.B. to me. She has a camping game that deserves praise, she has good recovery due to being able to float around a long time, and some useful aerials, but she's godawful at killing.

If I recall, R.O.B. has better approach and pressure tactics, throws that can potentially kill, and a rolling dodge that isn't stupid.

But it's funny how OS doesn't like going against Samus though. XD

 

[n00b]

Yeah.. I definitely don't agree about that Samus being a ROB counter. From my experience it just isn't the case. It might be so for inexperienced ROBs as they're simply bigger targets for Samus to combo, but a good ROB has so many pressure options that outclass Samus and anything she can do to defend against them. And besides, I've daired a ROB twice out of his Up B and he still recovered. :\

What I like about Samus is that patience pays off with her, and she can go from defensive to aggressive at any opening. :]

Let's hear some more about that grab release stuff. . I tried some concepts out today and it was very hit or miss.

 

[Tenki]

I think characters in Brawl have a certain hitstun resistance value, kinda like the stats on SSE stickers.

Samus, among a list of a few other characters seems to have alot of hitstun decrease, so she can combobreak out of almost anything, which troubles me because Sonic's U-air>spring>U-air works as a consecutive can't-hit-out-of-this combo for alot of characters, then I run into Samus and get spiked when I try to do a star KO.

 

[Mars-]

Wow this game is finally starting to get some depth. I was starting to go back to melee but I don't know this kinda makes me want to get better seeing that bombs, which were first thought of as completely useless in this game, are coming back. Bombs were so useful in melee a lot of people didn't realize this.

Hylian maybe you found out about some tactics for samus but you definately didn't invent samus. In my opinion you don't invent a character until you find a good way to play them tournament level.

As for top players quitting samus, there were really only 2 top samus players wes and hugs. HugS quit because he wants to win money. Wes however still plays and has a **** decent samus at that. I have some videos of me vsing his samus he used a lot of odd techniques I still gotta ask him if he wants them up because apparently he wants to go into brawl without massive videos. He also doesn't play tournaments yet because he is more focused on breaking down the game first.

I personally picked up zelda because she was easy just run and upsmash stupid **** like that works but my samus would always be able to keep up with people somehow. I really think that half of the community is dying, they like melee because it was advanced more and won't give brawl a chance to mature. But these people don't want to go back to melee either.

Anyway I guess this could be a heads up for my return to samus, I don't know yet though. I'm kind of having some problems with the normal smashers that show up for smashfests that although I would like to resolve it I am very stubborn and don't want to admit defeat.

 

[Adapt]

I think characters in Brawl have a certain hitstun resistance value, kinda like the stats on SSE stickers.

Samus, among a list of a few other characters seems to have alot of hitstun decrease, so she can combobreak out of almost anything, which troubles me because Sonic's U-air>spring>U-air works as a consecutive can't-hit-out-of-this combo for alot of characters, then I run into Samus and get spiked when I try to do a star KO.

Hitstun follows a rough trend of weight. Heavier characters suffer less from hitstun.

There are exceptions though. I did a bit of testing on this subject but I couldn't quite get a decent explanation so I didn't share my results.

example: sheik and zelda stay in hitstun for different lengths of time at the same percentage being hit by the same move.

At first I thought it was fall speed, but then ZSS who is almost exactly the same weight, is trapped longer than Zelda, and has fall speed in between Sheik and Zelda.

Samus was rather high on the rough scale I made iirc.

Maybe later tonight I'll post my results and see if other ppl can make sense of them.

 

[Overswarm]

Adapt, make that post in tactical discussion. I'm curious bout that now.